My Freshman Year:

In this section, Dr. Nathan spoke to international students about how American College life differs from the College life in their homes. I found their opinions to be very interesting. I was very surprised when I read the the Japanese student’s opinion that “the Japanese would consider each other too much to be able to do group projects together.” I thought that was a very strange thing to say. I can’t imagine the concept of “considering” someone else so much that it becomes difficult to actually work with them on an assignment. I’ve never had a thought like that when considering my fellow classmates. Honestly, it seems like such a trivial thing to work with other people together on a project.

They also spoke about the concept of friendship in America, and the lax regulations of classrooms and professors. I think it’s interesting that to most people, the professors at American Universities seem more willing to help than the ones at home. I believe that a professor should help their students to excel, and it doesn’t seem to me that professors in other nations do that. I also found the foreign students’ opinions on friendship in america to be interesting. I did not think that American students seem to be “falsely” friendly to students who grew up in different nations. I have not experienced this form of friendliness among others personally, but I have experienced other American student’s distance and sense of individualism. I was surprised to hear that in other cultures, friends would invite each other to their houses in order to meet their family. I personally would never think of doing that, and most of my friends don’t do that either.